


the dark i know well

by drunkonwriting



Category: Kuroshitsuji | Black Butler
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-10
Updated: 2016-07-10
Packaged: 2018-07-22 19:10:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,497
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7450726
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/drunkonwriting/pseuds/drunkonwriting
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sebastian has met many humans.</p>
<p>Well, not Sebastian, per se. (Though he, of course, has met quite a few humans too.) The darkness that became Sebastian has known many humans over the course of its long, long lifespan. Not that it needed to: for all their talk of individualism, one human was very like another. The same wants, the same fears, the same breaking points. The darkness that became Sebastian had killed most of them, watched many, amused itself with some.</p>
<p>And, with a select few, it bartered.</p>
            </blockquote>





	the dark i know well

**Author's Note:**

> just a brief character introspection i wrote after finishing the (at the time) new chapters of the manga. i find sebastian and ciel's relationship fascinating for several reasons, but especially that sebastian seems to have some sort of honest regard for ciel even as a demon.

Sebastian has met many humans.

Well, not _Sebastian_ , per se. (Though he, of course, has met quite a few humans too.) The darkness that became Sebastian has known many humans over the course of its long, long lifespan. Not that it needed to: for all their talk of individualism, one human was very like another. The same wants, the same fears, the same breaking points. The darkness that became Sebastian had killed most of them, watched many, amused itself with some.

And, with a select few, it bartered.

His previous masters had wanted him for a variety of reasons. Greed, sometimes, but that bored him and he often ended up eating their souls early out of spite. More often was revenge, which was always more interesting (and _bloody_ ) but could sour over time. Humans were the oddest of creatures—driven by hate one moment, then full of hope the next. More than one his masters had fallen to the wayside because they had 'healed' themselves of their anger and their vengence. It was aggravating to see ones hard work and time go wasted.

Good thing he didn't have to worry about that with his current master.

There's been something odd about Ciel ever since they came back from the forest of werewolves. After three years, Sebastian had thought he knew every one of his little master's moods and tantrums, but Ciel continued to be interesting by surprising him time and time again. Sebastian—and the darkness he had been before—knew humans, understood their motivations and desires often better than they did themselves. That Ciel could surprise him at all was an indication of how unique Ciel really was.

Sebastian never chose boring food if he could help it, after all.

Ciel looks up from his papers as Sebastian enters with tea, and his eye narrows. He's been looking at Sebastian more and more often, like he's a puzzle that needs to be unraveled, or a particularly tricky move in chess he needs to maneuver around. Sebastian would be lying if he says he doesn't enjoy, to an extent; Ciel is such a proud, arrogant creature that to make him curious is something of a compliment.

"Today's tea is peppermint," Sebastian says. "It's the highest quality in England, of course, and so light it might as well melt on the young master's tongue."

"Why did you contract with me, Sebastian?"

Sebastian does not drop things. (A Phantomhive butler should never drop things, especially in front of his master.) But he does set down the teapot he'd been holding more slowly than he might have otherwise.

"Why do you ask, my lord?"

Ciel's mouth is a tense, defiant thing. "Curiosity. Answer me, demon."

Sebastian considers struggling under the covenant, which demands his absolute obedience but doesn't enforce it. Demons would not be demons if they didn't have loopholes in their own contracts and the fact of the matter is that if Sebastian wants to disobey any order strongly enough, he can do so. He doesn't because it amuses him to follow Ciel's orders and, for the most part, they align with his own desires.

So he can refuse to answer. But then, of course, the little lord would become quite troublesome.

"You called for me," he says. "I have told you I can sense human souls, have I not? Yours sang with rage and hatred and the need for revenge. It is not that different from putting raw meat in front of a wolf, my lord."

Ciel doesn't show any satisfaction at getting an answer, as Sebastian expected he would. Instead, he looks more troubled.

"But you didn't have to answer," he says. "And you could have refused me when you saw who it was calling you, or just eaten my soul instead. Why did you enter into this damned agreement with me, Sebastian? Why have you stayed at my side for the past three years?"

Ah, perhaps Ciel is feeling anxious? He'd nearly been eaten, after all. Sebastian resolutely doesn't think about the sweet torture of being so close to eating Ciel's soul. Even though it is young and barely ripe, it is succulent—Sebastian can't image what it will be like in maturation without his teeth beginning to elongate.

"I stayed with you because it was what I vowed to do, my lord. A demon's word may belong to a demon, but that does not make it any less binding."

That is not a lie. A binding with holes is still a binding, after all.

"Please stop being deliberately obtuse, you damn demon," Ciel says. "You could have eaten me at any time, since we entered the contract! Why haven't you?"

Sebastian considers the small person in front of him. Even sitting, even a head and a half shorter, Ciel makes an intimidating figure—all in black, blue eye flashing, the maturing line of his jaw stuck out stubbornly. Sebastian can see—will always be able to see—the small, vulnerable child in that bravado, but Ciel is very different then he was at ten or even eleven or twelve.

"Human souls are not always the same," Sebastian says, though he never quite decided to do so. Ciel's eye flashes. "Unlike demons or shinigami, as you grow, you change. You ripen. A soul at infancy is very different from a soul in old age, even if it belongs to the same person."

"So you're waiting for me to… ripen?" Ciel's mouth makes a distasteful moue at the word, but his eyes are gleaming. "Am I a casket of wine, Sebastian?"

"You're much brattier than wine, my lord," Sebastian says.

" _Sebastian_."

"You asked the question, my lord. I simply answered it."

Ciel leans back in his chair, thoughtful. Sebastian waits, ever patient, to see if he will have some other query or demand. It's odd; when he first began this contract, he often was at a loss with how to deal with Ciel—humans may be his expertise, but Ciel was often an outlier, reacting in ways that Sebastian couldn't predict or expect even though he'd watched dozens of humans go through the same situation before. Now, though, he always has some idea of Ciel's reactions, even if he doesn't always know the precise details—Ciel only surprises him sometimes instead of all the time.

And Sebastian finds himself being known in the same way. Ciel tests him constantly, sometimes childishly sometimes not, in an attempt to understand his boundaries, his limitations, his desires. Sebastian's old masters had never bothered with that—for them, he had simply been a tool to be used, nothing more, which contented him since they were simply a meal to be eaten, nothing more. Ciel is something else, though, an outlier in this as well; Sebastian wants to eat his soul, of course, but he always finds that odd, mortal regret clinging to the notion. Sometimes he thinks it's just because once he eats Ciel he will no longer have the pleasant anticipation of eating Ciel and will have to find something entertaining to fill his days with again. Sometimes he thinks it's just a by-product of being forced into closer proximity with humans than he has been for decades—their mortality is just rubbing off on him, leaving afterimages.

Sometimes (rarely) he's honest with himself: he'll miss Ciel when he's gone.

"So you're waiting," Ciel says, drawing Sebastian's attention. "For when I reach peak potency. And when will that be, Sebastian?"

"It's a secret," Sebastian says, smiling.

Ciel scowls at him. "But it won't be before I reach my goal?" he demands. "You won't eat me before that?"

"Didn't I promise, my lord?"

"A demon's word is a shifty thing," Ciel says, proving once again that he is the cleverest master Sebastian's ever had. "I trust for right now that your interests align with mine and that you obey me because of that."

He leans forward and grabs Sebastian's lapels. Sebastian allows Ciel to reel him in, bending until his human spine pops and he and Ciel are at eye level. On even ground like this, Ciel is even more intimidating. When he grows up, into the height that Sebastian knows is destined for him, he will take over whatever he wishes on strength of personality alone. Sebastian, oddly enough, looks forward to watching it.

"I will see my goals realized, Sebastian," Ciel says, in the same tone that he uses whenever he reveals his eye to force Sebastian into obedience. "You will not eat me one minute before they are accomplished, do you understand? I don't care if I beg you for it on my knees—you will carry me to my goals and then my soul is yours to do with as you please."

Sebastian examines Ciel's pale face and intense eye and wonders how many nights the little master has been awake thinking about this, turning it over in his head. Sebastian smiles.

"Yes, my lord," he says.

**Author's Note:**

> thanks for reading!


End file.
